CRDA, created a decade ago to help finance housing projects in the downtown area, has been in discussions with family-owned Chase since last fall about the future of the parking lot at 10 Ford St., Freimuth said. Last fall, Chase withdrew the Ford Street parking lot as a potential location for a new federal courthouse. Chase said it was looking at developing “a bigger project on the property” and the courthouse would have eliminated “co-development possibilities.” The first of the new wave apartments around Bushnell Park to come up for lease is likely in the converted former office building at 55 Elm St., most recently the headquarters of the state’s Constitutional officers, including the Attorney General. South Norwalk-based Spinnaker Real Estate Partners expects the first of 160 apartments to be available in late spring in the 4-story annex. The annex was a later addition to the main, 7-story structure rising above Pulaski Circle and the park. How quickly development around Bushnell Park unfolds in the next few years will depend largely on the trajectory of overall downtown apartment leasing. Even with the addition of thousands of new apartments to the downtown since 2013, occupancy in the new projects has remained steady, above 90%. Hartford-based Lexington Partners plans to convert former, outdated office space at 15 Lewis St., which borders Bushnell Park, into apartments in a nearly $27 million project.

Apartment development around CT park set to boom. See the projects, what you might pay to live there

Thirteen percent of Meriden’s housing stock is considered affordable, second only to New Haven in the county. Much of that affordable housing was funded through low-income tax credits and is located downtown. Despite Meriden’s spot along the Hartford Line, business owners have said it’s difficult to find investors to build restaurants and breweries downtown because of the area’s income demographic. “It goes back to housing,” Lamont said. “More housing is needed to accommodate restaurants, and businesses and a developer taking out building permits.” Lamont and others Thursday pointed to Build for Connecticut as a possible solution for financing market-rate housing. The program is administered by the state Department of Housing and the Connecticut Housing Finance Authority. Build for Connecticut is a $800 million bond investment in the creation and preservation of housing covering a wide spectrum of need.

https://www.stamfordadvocate.com/recordjournal/article/ned-lamont-meriden-train-station-transit-oriented-18590254.php

Out of the nearly 2.8 million cars counted in construction zones in last year’s new speed camera program, nearly 25,000 drivers received written warnings, and more than 700 of them got fined at least $75, according to state data. Officials said the first year’s results is a good sign for the pilot Know the Zone speed safety program, which aimed to get drivers to slow down in work zones. The Department of Transportation, which is already looking to do it again, placed cameras from April through December at three major projects: on the Westport, Norwalk line and East Lyme on Interstate-95 and in Waterbury on Interstate-84. The program came out of state legislation in 2021 and in hopes of getting drivers to slow down and prevent construction site accidents. Anyone going at least 15 miles per hour over the speed limit received a letter in the mail from the state police with a photo of their license plate, warning them about their speed in the construction zone, and that they will receive a fine if they do it again. After the written warning, the second offense was a $75 fine and every one following was $150.

https://www.stamfordadvocate.com/westport/article/ct-dot-speed-camera-program-work-zones-i95-i84-18589612.php

As the $385 million school construction project gets underway, city officials are considering whether to enter a project labor agreement with local trade unions that would mandate a percentage of Norwich workers be employed on the project. The School Building Committee and the City Council would have to approve the project labor agreement with the Norwich-New London Building Trades Council. School Building Committee Chairman and Democratic Alderman Mark Bettencourt said the committee should be ready to seek construction bids by the end of 2024, so an agreement would need to be approved before then. Joe Toner, executive director of the Connecticut State Building Trades Council, told the School Building Committee that the agreement would set a percentage of project workers who are Norwich residents. An initial proposed agreement would have 25% Norwich residents required, with another 5% from New London County.

https://www.theday.com/local-news/20240106/norwich-considers-labor-agreement-for-school-construction-project/

With new buildings rising nearby on the former New Haven Veterans Memorial Coliseum site, Gov. Ned Lamont celebrated the city’s progress Wednesday and announced a $999,000 state “brownfields” grant to remediate leftover debris from the Coliseum’s 2007 demolition on property slated for a new, 277,435-square-foot life sciences and tech office building. The $200 million building — designed by world-class, New Haven-based architects Pelli Clark & Partners — is expected to be the third to rise in the first phase of development of the long-vacant property, which was a parking lot for years following the demolition of the Coliseum. The city and developer broke ground for the first mixed-use building to replace the Coliseum in November 2022. That 200-apartment building is the first of three buildings in Phase 1 of the site’s redevelopment, to be known as “Square 10.” The overall development is led by Spinnaker Real Estate Partners and LWLP New Haven LLC, to which the city transferred ownership of the property in late 2022. The office building is being developed by Durham, N.C.-based Ancora Partners LLC, which was represented Wednesday by Vice President, Development Peter Calkins.

https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/lamont-announce-990-000-clean-up-grant-new-haven-18586703.php

Construction has accelerated on a nine-lot subdivision project at 16 Neck Road more than a week after the town’s Zoning Enforcement Officer instructed the Westport-based developer, Frank Nocito, to halt work until he agreed to supervision by a town-approved engineer. Nocito, who hasn’t responded to questions shared by CT Examiner before the Christmas holiday, was sued by a former partner in a dispute over purchasing the 16 Neck Road property. That lawsuit was later withdrawn. As Old Lyme CT Properties Corp., Nocito is also named in an unresolved lawsuit filed in August in New London Superior Court by a local family regarding the long-stalled completion of a house in the Lords Meadow Subdivision in Old Lyme. After that lawsuit was filed, William Pitt Sotheby’s Realty in Old Lyme continued to sell and advertise projects in the Lords Meadow Subdivision.

Work Accelerates on 16 Neck Road Development After Request by Old Lyme to Cease Work

Paul Cerveny showed up at a Ledyard Planning & Zoning Commission just before Christmas to decry the plans by Gales Ferry Intermodal LLC and to reveal that he lived at the top of one of the highest hills in town, a place shrouded from the rest of the world. Another public hearing is scheduled at 6 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 11, at Ledyard Middle School, after which the commission could decide on the required permit. But representatives of Cashman Dredging & Marine said Friday they take seriously their obligation to ensure the health and safety of both their workers and the local community. Alan Perrault and Chase Davis, project coordinators at the Ledyard site, said in a phone interview that these are not the Wild West days of quarrying; every precaution is taken to ensure that the blasting and processing of materials is done in a controlled way, including the use of water to reduce the chance for silica dust to become a problem.

https://www.theday.com/business/20240103/modern-day-mountain-man-decries-plans-for-quarry-in-ledyard/

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will be holding a “hybrid public hearing” on what the agency said is an amended proposed plan for further work at a Connecticut Superfund Site. The hearing will be held starting at 7 p.m. on January 10, 2024 and running until all comments are heard, according to the EPA. The superfund site is in Woodstock. The federal agency said it would accept comments on the “preferred remedial alternative” identified for the Linemaster Switch Corp. site. in the proposed plan. No new information will be presented at the hearing, according to the agency. “The Proposed Plan presents EPA’s proposed changes to the current (ongoing) remedy for the site.” “EPA concluded that as long as soil near the dry well was a source of groundwater contamination, VOC concentrations in groundwater posed an unacceptable risk to human health and the environment, given the possible use of the groundwater for drinking water. Cleanup activities included the installation of soil and groundwater treatment systems,” EPA reports in background on the project.

EPA proposes $11.4 million amended cleanup plan for CT Superfund site. What to know.

For the first time in the United States, turbines are sending electricity to the grid from the sites of two large offshore wind farms. The joint owners of the Vineyard Wind project, Avangrid and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, announced Wednesday the first electricity from one turbine at what will be a 62-turbine wind farm 15 miles (24 kilometers) off the coast of Massachusetts. Danish wind energy developer Ørsted and the utility Eversource announced last month that their first turbine was sending electricity from what will be a 12-turbine wind farm, South Fork Wind, 35 miles (56 kilometers) east of Montauk Point, New York. Avangrid CEO Pedro Azagra said 2023 was a historic year for offshore wind with “steel in the water and people at work, and today, we begin a new chapter and welcome 2024 by delivering the first clean offshore wind power to the grid in Massachusetts.” Avangrid is an energy company headquartered in Orange, Connecticut. Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners is a large fund manager and global leader in renewable energy investments.

https://www.stamfordadvocate.com/business/article/two-large-offshore-wind-sites-are-sending-power-18587103.php

Mayor Peter Nystrom highlighted major public and private developments, fueled by millions of dollars in state and federal grants during his annual State of the City address Tuesday but also urged city, school and utility officials to curb spending in the coming budget years. NPU broke ground in November on a five-year, $200 million new sewage treatment plant that is expected to greatly improve water quality in Norwich Harbor and the Thames River, just as new owners of the Marina at American Wharf are making major improvements to that centerpiece on the waterfront, Nystrom said. Nystrom, a Republican, will have to work with a Democratic majority City Council in his final two years as mayor. Nystrom specifically criticized a proposal being considered by the School Building Committee that calls for prearranged labor agreements between construction unions and contractors for work on the first two new schools. He said project labor agreements for the school construction project would negate the added state grant reimbursements Norwich’s state legislators secured in the last General Assembly session.

https://www.theday.com/local-news/20240102/norwich-mayor-urges-spending-restraints-touts-economic-development-projects/